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U.S. Should Adopt Higher Standards for Science Education

38 points by DLay 14y ago

dkhenry 14y ago
So quick things I noticed reading the Article 1. There are still places in the US where our _current_ standards are world class ( boston is given as an example ) 2. This quote """ The first draft, released in May, explicitly included evolution and climate change. A second draft will be available for comment this fall. """ Why, why as your drafting standards for something that could help all americans do you intentionally politicise it. You have now turned this from something everyone would agree with ( We need to educate our children better ) to something that people will draw up battle lines off of. I understand that people see the denayal of these two aspects as a marker of an anti-science mindset, but the solution is not to just draw the line in the sand and use the tynnary of the majority as a hammer to force your changes through. Prediction, this will turn political and nothing profitable will get done and a majority of america will continue to see its education standards fall.
- Retric 14y ago
 I up-voted you, but there is nothing political about evolution or climate change outside the US. If you want a world class science education you need to actually you know teach science. And science is based on two and only two ideas, everything is on the table AND reality dictates your views though experimentation. Sacrifice either of them to political grandstanding and you are doing something else. PS: Biology is so closely tied to evolution at this point that I can't help but wonder what's left once you discard it. Global warming is less important, but it's rather hard to avoid that topic for 12 years.
 - pwny 14y ago
 Pretty much only taxonomy, anatomy and cellular biology remain once you take away evolution from a biology class (before university level at least). All of them are important and insightful, but of those 3 I think only anatomy is on par in importance with evolution as far as someone who's not going to study science for a living is concerned.
 - Retric 14y ago
 Recent updates to Taxonomy have used DNA testing along with genetic drift to move things around a fair bit. So, in the modern context it's really more a map of evolutionary change than a list of animals with their traits. Which leaves Anatomy and Cellular biology, but again only when looking at individual species. Even just showing the 'fish' like stage of a human embryo brings up rather difficult questions without evolutionary context. As is a lot of the stranger parts of Anatomy and Cellular biology. PS: By 'fish' I mean when you basically have head + spine and before leg's show up.
 - dkhenry 14y ago
 But were not talking about ourside the US were talking about the US, and unfortuinitly it is political. Sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that roughly half the population won't disregard everything your working on to get two bullet points off your list is just stupid. Also this idea that science is underpinned by evolution and cliement science is laughable. I guess chemestry and physics don't count ?
 - Goronmon 14y ago
 Sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that roughly half the population won't disregard everything your working on to get two bullet points off your list is just stupid. Sticking our heads in the sand and pretending important topics like evolution and climate change don't exist seems worse.
 - Retric 14y ago
 Climate science IS chemistry and physics. More specifically Climate science is mostly Spectroscopy and Thermodynamics and if it's off the table you can't really talk about them. Nor can you can't talk about convection currents which means you can talk about the gas laws which means you can talk about heat engines. PS: And no I am not kidding, if you actually understand why a mass spectrometer works then climate change is obvious.
 - cglace 14y ago
 You may not be able to teach climate science without Spectroscopy and Thermodynamics but the converse isn't true. We aren't going to produce better engineers and physicists because we threw in a few weeks on thermohaline circulation.
 - Jabbles 14y ago
 if you actually understand why a mass spectrometer works then climate change is obvious Please elaborate.
 - ef4 14y ago
 You're overestimating the anti-science critics. You can teach all the spectroscopy and thermodynamics you want and they won't care, because they don't know what that stuff is. It's purely the words "climate change" that they'll attack. And picking that fight is not a winning solution. The winning solution is to show children how awesome science is, give them the fundamental tools to participate in it, and let them see for themselves the validity of conclusions like climate change. We're in the mess we're in because too many people's science education was purely focussed on the conclusions of science without the methods of science. When "science class" means memorizing facts it's no different than catechism, and truth becomes a question of one authority vs another. The conclusions of science are of secondary importance to the process of science.
- vec 14y ago
 Because "We're going to make a spec that is intentionally vague on the one section that some people will bend over backwards to willfully misapply" is bad politics and "We're going to tighten standards across the board, but remain silent on two fundamental and well understood cornerstone concepts because they're likely to make people mad" is terrible policy. Besides, the people who are opposed to teaching evolution and/or climate science are going to take a microscope to any new science teaching standard, so we may as well be up front about the goals and get the fight over with at the frontend.
 - dkhenry 14y ago
 So is our goal to push more teaching of evolution and global warming or is it to make science standards better ? By specifically calling out hot button buzz words your priming the pump for a political fight.
 - ktizo 14y ago
 Evolution is not scientifically controversial and you can't teach biology without it. The political fight on this is not some recent invention of educators, but is just the current battle in a religious propaganda war for the right to dictate reality that has been going on since before the time of Galileo. Not mentioning key subjects to keep the religious happy is not a responsible approach for people who want sciences to be taught properly in school.
 - ef4 14y ago
 But education (at least the way we do it now) is a political phenomenon. Science has little to do with it. Too many scientifically-minded people ignore this reality and cling to the idealistic notion that schools will teach the best ideas, so we simply need to show our ideas are best. No. Schools are politically controlled and will teach what political power dictates. So long as scientifically literate people think we're above politics, we'll keep losing. (Personally, I'd rather continue to see a growing number of people empowered to opt out of politically controlled education entirely.)
- jere 14y ago
 What are you suggesting? That we let poorly educated people dictate education standards?
- tallanvor 14y ago
 Because evolution and climate change are well documented theories backed by studies conducted using accepted methods. Although they are considered theories, they are theories in the same sense that we have the theory of gravity. Just because certain religions or political parties try to deny facts does not mean that scientists and engineers can pretend that the truth is something other than what it is.
 - cristianpascu 14y ago
 Anyone with a little bit of education in sciences, and philosophy of science, should be aware that the theory of gravity and the theories that make up what is known as evolution, have a very different theoretical background. The theory of gravity has put people on the Moon and a rover on Mars. The theory of evolution creates plausible scenarios of why we see what we see. There's much politics in the plausibility part. And there's a lot of politics in putting gravity and evolution on the same shelf. It's sad to see how someone, even scientists, are considered to be anti-science for even doubting evolution.
 - enraged_camel 14y ago
 >>It's sad to see how someone, even scientists, are considered to be anti-science for even doubting evolution.<< There are no viable alternative scientific models that compete with the theory of evolution in terms of explaining change across successive generations of biological organisms. There are theological models, but those by definition do not have any scientific evidence. Which is why doubting evolution is considered anti-scientific - rightly so, in my opinion. The amount of hard evidence we have for the theory of evolution is so overwhelming at this point that doubting it has two possible reasons: the person either does not understand science in general and evolution in particular, or they are driven by a religious agenda. Incidentally, both of these are very common in America due to shoddy science education (esp. with regards to imparting critical thinking skills in children) and the influence of religion in politics (and therefore education).
 - cristianpascu 14y ago
- rmc 14y ago
 If they were to leave out evolution & climate change, it would bring any statistics into disrepute. If they did it and the statistics showed some of the best science education in the world it would be laughable if a large percentage of students were taught the world is only 6,000 years old. It would reek of soviet era bullshit statistics that everyone else laughs at. There isn't always 2 sides to every story. Sometimes there's 1.
zhemao 14y ago
Better standards are good, but without change in other areas, they won't have much effect. If kids are failing to meet the current standards, how do you expect them to meet newer, more rigorous ones? I am sure Massachusetts and Minnesota's education systems have other things going for them besides standards.
- sukuriant 14y ago
  Better teachers. I'm sorry but, using my mother as an example, in a single year, my mother elevated inner-city students in English from very low scores to very high scores. I'd need to ask her for specifics; but, the change was incredible. I believe they were getting near highest marks in the area. She demanded a LOT from the students, a truly incredible amount of writing and work. She was very, very hard on her students; but at the same time rewarded achievement greatly and taught in an effective, repetitive way. Years down the road, her old students have repeatedly come back to her, thanking her for her work with them. It is all about the teachers. If people are sufficiently interested in her method, I might be able to get her to log in to my account (or one of her own), and expound upon her methods of training and relating to the children.
  - raphman 14y ago
    interested
  - MordinSolus 14y ago
    We need better teachers AND a better system AND better parents. We can't just put all of the expectations on the teachers and expect any sort of change. We do need teachers who are willing to be tough (like it sounds like your mother was) yet caring, but that requires a system that rewards teachers not based on seniority but on merit (sorry unions) but also doesn't encourage teachers to artificially raise grades or teach to specific tests. This means we'd have to invest more in evaluating progress in students, instead of just throwing standardized tests at kids. We also need parents who allow teachers to be tough (no complaining because your kid fails!) _and_ who are supportive yet disciplined back on the homefront.
Shivetya 14y ago
Changing standards is meaningless unless you dismantle the current structure of public education. Ever since its founding the Department of Education has not noticeably improved the outcomes of students nationwide. Nor has the many fold increased spending. Yes change will require rethinking having a teachers union Where we have gone wrong is that school systems are saddled with far too many non-teaching positions and new school buildings tend way too many times to be symbols of the politicians who had them built.
- panzagl 14y ago
  There are plenty of states without teachers' unions, and guess what- the kids don't perform any better there. Non-teaching positions are the results of regulations and laws to 'protect' the interests of students. Until someone makes hard decisions that pare back some of those mandated 'services' they're not going to go away.
  - droithomme 14y ago
    "the kids don't perform any better there" You bring up an interesting data point. I wasn't even aware there were states with no teachers unions, that is a bit surprising. Do you know which ones? Without looking up the states and the stats, I'll take your word for it. I have no expectation that labor unions increase or decrease teaching quality, so if true as we'll assume, this is not particularly surprising. I would expect, though I haven't checked, that these areas with teachers unions have better pay and benefits for teachers. Is that true, from the data you have analyzed?
lucian303 14y ago
U.S. Should Adopt Education First
TheCount 14y ago
These results can obscure as much as they reveal. The demographics of the US differ from European countries - the US has proportionally more students from lower scoring ethnic groups, as compared to most European countries. If you look only at non-immigrants in European countries, and whites in the US, the US looks quite a bit more competitive.[1] Not to mention, Massachusetts and Minnesota have more of the higher scoring groups (principally whites) and fewer of the lower scoring groups (Hispanics and blacks) than the US as a whole. It's important to understand where the differences in scores lie, and not just mash it all together and shout cliches like "More money!" Though it does seem like Finland's got something special. [1] super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-about-pisa-scores-usa.html
jstalin 14y ago
Being a former board of education member for a large city, I can say with some experience that "standards" alone will do nothing. Education is so messed up beyond recognition today. There's so much incredible bureaucracy. So much. Unimaginable. Federal, state, local. School districts have centralized to the point that it's nearly impossible to implement changes unless it's some sort of "one size fits all" scheme. Local schools are hamstrung by work rules, union rules, tenure rules, and then on top of that state and local education "standards." Then there are socio-economic issues. Parents who themselves never learned to read. Kids living in areas where the person to look up to is a drug dealer. Cultures of dependence and reliance on government handouts. Many (if not most) urban school districts have dropout rates of over 50%. Even where there is not that sort of culture, there are parents who think that the schools are babysitters and any kid who does something wrong much have done so because it's the school's fault. And of course, teachers unions, licensing rules, pay scales, and lack of individual accountability contribute as well. It's such an enormous problem that there's no single answer. I think that decentralizing education would go a long way toward helping to spur innovation. Charter schools, vouchers, and removing attendance boundaries help too. Centralization has really hurt education and the only answer that seems to be proposed is more centralization.
fjorder 14y ago
One problem with this article is that it attempts to exonerate some American districts (that happen to be some of the most affluent urban regions in the country) by pointing out they can compete favorably with the world's top nations. That is an Apples to Oranges comparison. They're being compared to those entire nations including all children from their affluent urban suburbs to their impoverished backwoods one-room schools. If you compared Boston's math performance to only the richest urban areas of Finland, South Korea, or Canada you'd find the disparity as stark as ever.
japhyr 14y ago
I think this points out the need for a "crowdsourced" set of standards. I put crowdsourced in quotes because it needs to be done carefully. We need a body of standards that is subject to continuous improvement by subject-matter experts, and expert teachers. It needs to be set up so that popular opinions can be expressed, but simple votes do not override expert conclusions. This body of standards should be mapped to each state's standards. Teachers could work from the crowdsourced standards, but fulfill reporting requirements on their state standards. This is what good teachers in states with poor standards do anyways. Teachers work from a set of high-quality standards, but report on their own state's standards.

38 points by DLay 14y ago

So quick things I noticed reading the Article 1. There are still places in the US where our _current_ standards are world class ( boston is given as an example ) 2. This quote """ The first draft, released in May, explicitly included evolution and climate change. A second draft will be available for comment this fall. """ Why, why as your drafting standards for something that could help all americans do you intentionally politicise it. You have now turned this from something everyone would agree with ( We need to educate our children better ) to something that people will draw up battle lines off of. I understand that people see the denayal of these two aspects as a marker of an anti-science mindset, but the solution is not to just draw the line in the sand and use the tynnary of the majority as a hammer to force your changes through. Prediction, this will turn political and nothing profitable will get done and a majority of america will continue to see its education standards fall.

Retric 14y ago
I up-voted you, but there is nothing political about evolution or climate change outside the US. If you want a world class science education you need to actually you know teach science. And science is based on two and only two ideas, everything is on the table AND reality dictates your views though experimentation. Sacrifice either of them to political grandstanding and you are doing something else. PS: Biology is so closely tied to evolution at this point that I can't help but wonder what's left once you discard it. Global warming is less important, but it's rather hard to avoid that topic for 12 years.
- pwny 14y ago
  Pretty much only taxonomy, anatomy and cellular biology remain once you take away evolution from a biology class (before university level at least). All of them are important and insightful, but of those 3 I think only anatomy is on par in importance with evolution as far as someone who's not going to study science for a living is concerned.
  - Retric 14y ago
    Recent updates to Taxonomy have used DNA testing along with genetic drift to move things around a fair bit. So, in the modern context it's really more a map of evolutionary change than a list of animals with their traits. Which leaves Anatomy and Cellular biology, but again only when looking at individual species. Even just showing the 'fish' like stage of a human embryo brings up rather difficult questions without evolutionary context. As is a lot of the stranger parts of Anatomy and Cellular biology. PS: By 'fish' I mean when you basically have head + spine and before leg's show up.
- dkhenry 14y ago
  But were not talking about ourside the US were talking about the US, and unfortuinitly it is political. Sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that roughly half the population won't disregard everything your working on to get two bullet points off your list is just stupid. Also this idea that science is underpinned by evolution and cliement science is laughable. I guess chemestry and physics don't count ?
  - Goronmon 14y ago
    Sticking our heads in the sand and pretending that roughly half the population won't disregard everything your working on to get two bullet points off your list is just stupid. Sticking our heads in the sand and pretending important topics like evolution and climate change don't exist seems worse.
  - Retric 14y ago
    Climate science IS chemistry and physics. More specifically Climate science is mostly Spectroscopy and Thermodynamics and if it's off the table you can't really talk about them. Nor can you can't talk about convection currents which means you can talk about the gas laws which means you can talk about heat engines. PS: And no I am not kidding, if you actually understand why a mass spectrometer works then climate change is obvious.
    - cglace 14y ago
      You may not be able to teach climate science without Spectroscopy and Thermodynamics but the converse isn't true. We aren't going to produce better engineers and physicists because we threw in a few weeks on thermohaline circulation.
    - Jabbles 14y ago
      if you actually understand why a mass spectrometer works then climate change is obvious Please elaborate.
    - ef4 14y ago
      You're overestimating the anti-science critics. You can teach all the spectroscopy and thermodynamics you want and they won't care, because they don't know what that stuff is. It's purely the words "climate change" that they'll attack. And picking that fight is not a winning solution. The winning solution is to show children how awesome science is, give them the fundamental tools to participate in it, and let them see for themselves the validity of conclusions like climate change. We're in the mess we're in because too many people's science education was purely focussed on the conclusions of science without the methods of science. When "science class" means memorizing facts it's no different than catechism, and truth becomes a question of one authority vs another. The conclusions of science are of secondary importance to the process of science.
vec 14y ago
Because "We're going to make a spec that is intentionally vague on the one section that some people will bend over backwards to willfully misapply" is bad politics and "We're going to tighten standards across the board, but remain silent on two fundamental and well understood cornerstone concepts because they're likely to make people mad" is terrible policy. Besides, the people who are opposed to teaching evolution and/or climate science are going to take a microscope to any new science teaching standard, so we may as well be up front about the goals and get the fight over with at the frontend.
- dkhenry 14y ago
  So is our goal to push more teaching of evolution and global warming or is it to make science standards better ? By specifically calling out hot button buzz words your priming the pump for a political fight.
  - ktizo 14y ago
    Evolution is not scientifically controversial and you can't teach biology without it. The political fight on this is not some recent invention of educators, but is just the current battle in a religious propaganda war for the right to dictate reality that has been going on since before the time of Galileo. Not mentioning key subjects to keep the religious happy is not a responsible approach for people who want sciences to be taught properly in school.
    - ef4 14y ago
      But education (at least the way we do it now) is a political phenomenon. Science has little to do with it. Too many scientifically-minded people ignore this reality and cling to the idealistic notion that schools will teach the best ideas, so we simply need to show our ideas are best. No. Schools are politically controlled and will teach what political power dictates. So long as scientifically literate people think we're above politics, we'll keep losing. (Personally, I'd rather continue to see a growing number of people empowered to opt out of politically controlled education entirely.)
jere 14y ago
What are you suggesting? That we let poorly educated people dictate education standards?
tallanvor 14y ago
Because evolution and climate change are well documented theories backed by studies conducted using accepted methods. Although they are considered theories, they are theories in the same sense that we have the theory of gravity. Just because certain religions or political parties try to deny facts does not mean that scientists and engineers can pretend that the truth is something other than what it is.
- cristianpascu 14y ago
 Anyone with a little bit of education in sciences, and philosophy of science, should be aware that the theory of gravity and the theories that make up what is known as evolution, have a very different theoretical background. The theory of gravity has put people on the Moon and a rover on Mars. The theory of evolution creates plausible scenarios of why we see what we see. There's much politics in the plausibility part. And there's a lot of politics in putting gravity and evolution on the same shelf. It's sad to see how someone, even scientists, are considered to be anti-science for even doubting evolution.
 - enraged_camel 14y ago
 >>It's sad to see how someone, even scientists, are considered to be anti-science for even doubting evolution.<< There are no viable alternative scientific models that compete with the theory of evolution in terms of explaining change across successive generations of biological organisms. There are theological models, but those by definition do not have any scientific evidence. Which is why doubting evolution is considered anti-scientific - rightly so, in my opinion. The amount of hard evidence we have for the theory of evolution is so overwhelming at this point that doubting it has two possible reasons: the person either does not understand science in general and evolution in particular, or they are driven by a religious agenda. Incidentally, both of these are very common in America due to shoddy science education (esp. with regards to imparting critical thinking skills in children) and the influence of religion in politics (and therefore education).
 - cristianpascu 14y ago
rmc 14y ago
If they were to leave out evolution & climate change, it would bring any statistics into disrepute. If they did it and the statistics showed some of the best science education in the world it would be laughable if a large percentage of students were taught the world is only 6,000 years old. It would reek of soviet era bullshit statistics that everyone else laughs at. There isn't always 2 sides to every story. Sometimes there's 1.

zhemao 14y ago

Better standards are good, but without change in other areas, they won't have much effect. If kids are failing to meet the current standards, how do you expect them to meet newer, more rigorous ones? I am sure Massachusetts and Minnesota's education systems have other things going for them besides standards.

sukuriant 14y ago
Better teachers. I'm sorry but, using my mother as an example, in a single year, my mother elevated inner-city students in English from very low scores to very high scores. I'd need to ask her for specifics; but, the change was incredible. I believe they were getting near highest marks in the area. She demanded a LOT from the students, a truly incredible amount of writing and work. She was very, very hard on her students; but at the same time rewarded achievement greatly and taught in an effective, repetitive way. Years down the road, her old students have repeatedly come back to her, thanking her for her work with them. It is all about the teachers. If people are sufficiently interested in her method, I might be able to get her to log in to my account (or one of her own), and expound upon her methods of training and relating to the children.
- raphman 14y ago
  interested
- MordinSolus 14y ago
  We need better teachers AND a better system AND better parents. We can't just put all of the expectations on the teachers and expect any sort of change. We do need teachers who are willing to be tough (like it sounds like your mother was) yet caring, but that requires a system that rewards teachers not based on seniority but on merit (sorry unions) but also doesn't encourage teachers to artificially raise grades or teach to specific tests. This means we'd have to invest more in evaluating progress in students, instead of just throwing standardized tests at kids. We also need parents who allow teachers to be tough (no complaining because your kid fails!) _and_ who are supportive yet disciplined back on the homefront.

Shivetya 14y ago

Changing standards is meaningless unless you dismantle the current structure of public education. Ever since its founding the Department of Education has not noticeably improved the outcomes of students nationwide. Nor has the many fold increased spending. Yes change will require rethinking having a teachers union Where we have gone wrong is that school systems are saddled with far too many non-teaching positions and new school buildings tend way too many times to be symbols of the politicians who had them built.

panzagl 14y ago
There are plenty of states without teachers' unions, and guess what- the kids don't perform any better there. Non-teaching positions are the results of regulations and laws to 'protect' the interests of students. Until someone makes hard decisions that pare back some of those mandated 'services' they're not going to go away.
- droithomme 14y ago
  "the kids don't perform any better there" You bring up an interesting data point. I wasn't even aware there were states with no teachers unions, that is a bit surprising. Do you know which ones? Without looking up the states and the stats, I'll take your word for it. I have no expectation that labor unions increase or decrease teaching quality, so if true as we'll assume, this is not particularly surprising. I would expect, though I haven't checked, that these areas with teachers unions have better pay and benefits for teachers. Is that true, from the data you have analyzed?

lucian303 14y ago

U.S. Should Adopt Education First

TheCount 14y ago

These results can obscure as much as they reveal. The demographics of the US differ from European countries - the US has proportionally more students from lower scoring ethnic groups, as compared to most European countries. If you look only at non-immigrants in European countries, and whites in the US, the US looks quite a bit more competitive.[1] Not to mention, Massachusetts and Minnesota have more of the higher scoring groups (principally whites) and fewer of the lower scoring groups (Hispanics and blacks) than the US as a whole. It's important to understand where the differences in scores lie, and not just mash it all together and shout cliches like "More money!" Though it does seem like Finland's got something special. [1] super-economy.blogspot.com/2010/12/amazing-truth-about-pisa-scores-usa.html

jstalin 14y ago

Being a former board of education member for a large city, I can say with some experience that "standards" alone will do nothing. Education is so messed up beyond recognition today. There's so much incredible bureaucracy. So much. Unimaginable. Federal, state, local. School districts have centralized to the point that it's nearly impossible to implement changes unless it's some sort of "one size fits all" scheme. Local schools are hamstrung by work rules, union rules, tenure rules, and then on top of that state and local education "standards." Then there are socio-economic issues. Parents who themselves never learned to read. Kids living in areas where the person to look up to is a drug dealer. Cultures of dependence and reliance on government handouts. Many (if not most) urban school districts have dropout rates of over 50%. Even where there is not that sort of culture, there are parents who think that the schools are babysitters and any kid who does something wrong much have done so because it's the school's fault. And of course, teachers unions, licensing rules, pay scales, and lack of individual accountability contribute as well. It's such an enormous problem that there's no single answer. I think that decentralizing education would go a long way toward helping to spur innovation. Charter schools, vouchers, and removing attendance boundaries help too. Centralization has really hurt education and the only answer that seems to be proposed is more centralization.

fjorder 14y ago

One problem with this article is that it attempts to exonerate some American districts (that happen to be some of the most affluent urban regions in the country) by pointing out they can compete favorably with the world's top nations. That is an Apples to Oranges comparison. They're being compared to those entire nations including all children from their affluent urban suburbs to their impoverished backwoods one-room schools. If you compared Boston's math performance to only the richest urban areas of Finland, South Korea, or Canada you'd find the disparity as stark as ever.

japhyr 14y ago

I think this points out the need for a "crowdsourced" set of standards. I put crowdsourced in quotes because it needs to be done carefully. We need a body of standards that is subject to continuous improvement by subject-matter experts, and expert teachers. It needs to be set up so that popular opinions can be expressed, but simple votes do not override expert conclusions. This body of standards should be mapped to each state's standards. Teachers could work from the crowdsourced standards, but fulfill reporting requirements on their state standards. This is what good teachers in states with poor standards do anyways. Teachers work from a set of high-quality standards, but report on their own state's standards.